Blogs I Follow

* China manages to shrink its deserts each year

Xinhua: China’s deserts are shrinking by 7,585 sq km annually, compared with an annual expansion of 10,400 sq km at the end of last century. The decrease showed the desertification that started in China in the late 1990s had been “primarily brought under control,” said Zhu Lieke, deputy director of the State Forestry Administration.

China has 2.64 million sq km of land eaten up by desertification, which accounts for 27.46 percent of its land territory.

The Chinese government invests 2 billion yuan (250 million U.S.dollars) a year in fighting desertification, but it is difficult to hit the target that all the country’s “curable” desertified land will be restored by 2050. It would cost at least 238.5 billion yuan (29.8 billion U.S. dollars) to reach the goal, said Zhu.

Both the reduction of deserts and the diversion of water from southern to northern rivers, and – of course – the Three Gorges Dam, are signs that a country where the majority of top leaders are trained and experienced engineers will find engineering solutions to its problems. See – http://chindiapedia.org/Politicslocalandgeo.aspx